What's next?

Yesterday, when I was waiting in front of Cameron's school for him to be dismissed, I had a conversation with the father of the another white boy in Cameron's class. Seems that boy has been having problems too. The father has been to the school several times to express his concerns. The boy has gone to the teacher several times to tell her someone is being mean. She has said she doesn't want to hear it. This is according to the father. Our experience with the teacher seems to be a little different. (It could be because we have created such a stink about it.) Although, I will admit she seems quite scatter-brained and too busy at times. She works with 5-6-7 year-olds all day, so I think she's entitled to screw up sometimes, but not when a child is asking for help from bullies. NEVER, EVER mess that up. Anyway, the father had a meeting with the principal a couple of months ago after his son was hurt by several other kids on the playground and had to spend recess in the nurse's office being iced. He asked the principal what the punishment is for the children who physically harm other children. She informed him that they get talked to, a note sent home, and they spend recess in the Principal's office. He called his son into the office with him and told him the next time a kid hits him, then clobber them. The principal told him he couldn't tell his son that. And he said to the principal, "Why not? There's no punishment. My son's missing out on recess anyway because he's in the nurse's office. If there's no punishment, the bullies are going to keep bullying and the kids being bullied are getting hurt and then punished because they miss recess when they did nothing wrong." I agree with him 100%. He also told me that these past couple of weeks the kids have been calling his son names. The teacher said she didn't want to hear it, so the father told his son to call names back. Guess who got in trouble. Yes, the white boy. Father was up at the school again letting them know how he feels about the difference the races are treated. When the Principal's secretary told him there was no favoritism toward the Hispanics, he disagreed and said, "Everything done at this school is to please the Mexicans, don't give me that bull." Um, once again, here here!

So, his experience seems to be much the same as ours. I think we just made a bigger stink of it and maybe threatening to call the superintendent did something for us. Maybe Cameron is just on the radar of so many people since he has an IEP and an apparent processing disorder. Maybe they are taking better care of Cameron because he doesn't process threats as quick as other kids and they know he will get hurt. I don't know. I do know that hitting, threats, and racist name calling should be zero tolerance. Period. Hitting and other physical violence should be automatic suspension, especially after a note sent home didn't work. The boy that hit Cameron the other day has been talked to and had a note sent home more than once. From what I've heard, the mother of the boy doesn't care. They watch the Ultimate Fighting and wrestling shows together as a family. From what I understand, they make income off of it somehow, maybe betting? I don't know. And just so you know, I'm not going around asking about this kid or anything, I still don't know which boy it is. I know the name, not the face. This info is just being randomly given to me by several people. Staff people who are also sick of the bullying and think something more extreme should be done as far as consequences for violence. I suspect they don't say anything because they don't want to stir the pot and risk their jobs. There are so many unemployed teachers/ school staff in California right now, that the ones that do have jobs just avert their eyes and keep their mouths closed. Hoping that someone like me will come along and be the squeaky wheel and incite a change. This change is not something I know how to do. I guess the first step is complaining to the principal. Then what? Superintendent? Lawyer? Media?

Odio la escuela de Cameron

The title is supposed to say...I hate Cameron's school. I don't know for sure since I DON'T SPEAK SPANISH. But that's what the online English/Spanish translator gave me when I submitted it.

About a month ago Cameron started asking Chris to come to school to protect him. We just kinda thought Cameron was having a bad day here and there and that was his way of expressing it. We didn't realize that it was every day. On November 30th, I went to the office and asked for an appointment with the principal. I was told to wait a few minutes and the principal would be with me. I waited. And waited. And waited. Finally, I called Chris on my cell while I was right there in the office, and read off the principal's name and phone number that were posted on the wall. (I felt like one of those people that call 911 while they are in the ER waiting for help.) I had him call for an appointment personally since, 1, I wanted to make sure it would be for a time that Chris would be there, and 2, because Chris is the one that Cameron has been asking for protection. Chris was able to speak to the principal by phone and explained that Cameron was being bullied and asking for protection. The principal seemed genuinely concerned. She set up the appointment for December 3rd, and assigned someone to keep an eye on Cameron on the playground and take notes. December 3rd came; we had a phone conference since the principal had fallen and hurt her back and was not cleared by her doctor to return to school. Present at the meeting were Cameron's teacher, the principal's secretary, and me and Chris. The principal's secretary read the notes that the monitor had taken; we found out that the situation was a bit worse than we imagined. One of the observations was on November 30th, (the day I first brought their attention to the bullying.) It stated that while Cameron was heading back to his class after lunch recess, an older boy (possibly a third grader) said, "Let's get him." Then he and three boys went after him. The monitor stopped them before they got to him. It hurts me to think what would have happened if I wouldn't have gone that day. The person wouldn't have been watching for this. The meeting lasted about 45 minutes and we left feeling like maybe there was hope. The principal later sent this email: (I've replaced the names with the title of the person)

From: Principal
Sent: Thu 12/3/2009 10:32 PM
To: Cameron's teacher; csinclair19@xxxxxxx
Cc: School councelor; Principal's secretary
Subject: RE: Cameron

Thank you Ms. Teacher. Excellent steps taken.

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair, Mrs. Secretary and Mrs. Teacher,

Thank you Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair, Mrs. Secretary and Mrs. Teacher for participating in the phone conference this morning. I am so sorry I was not able to be there in person.

As per my notes Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair reported the following regarding Cameron:

* Cameron is feeling unsafe at school.
* Mr. Sinclair reported that Cameron asked dad if he could go to school with him to protect him.
* Mr. Sinclair reported the following students have been bothering Cameron:
* Gabrielle
* Jonathan
* Erica
* Kimberly
* Orelly
* Jose C.
* Around Nov. 10 Cameron came to school with a hurt finger. Gabrielle purposefully slammed her hand on his hurt finger. Cameron did not report this incident to the teacher. When parents asked Cameron why he didn't tell the teacher, he replied by stating that he didn't want to get anyone in trouble. Mrs. Sinclair also reported that Cameron shared that when he told Mrs. Student Teacher about a previous incident that she replied by saying, " So you are blaming the other student." Cameron of course did not feel supported at all by this comment. Mrs. Sinclair said Cameron is not comfortable telling the adults at school when something goes wrong.
* Mrs. Sinclair reported that Cameron begins to cry when he is picked up from school as though he is communicating relief from the stress of the day.
* Cameron shared that Gabrielle told him he is disgusting.
* Another child (name unknown) held his fist up to his face and told him he was going to hit him.
* Wrestling behavior on the playground
* Parents reported that Cameron asked. " When is my skin going to be brown?" and " I am never going to be Hispanic."

Thank you Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair for sharing your concerns with us. I am deeply sorry that this negative behavior has been occurring here at school for your son Cameron. It is completely unacceptable. Our action plan is the following:

* Continue with vigilant supervision on the playground so that we can completely curtail this type of behavior.
* I will communicate this concern to the rest of the staff as well so that it may be more effectively addressed on the playground.
* Mrs. Teacher will continue with the steps she mentioned. As well as call other parents of students who may be repeated offenders.
* We all need to talk to Cameron to encourage him to let the adults know when he is feeling unsafe or hurt emotionally or physically by others and continuously enforce that he is safe at school.
* When Ms. School Councelor returns I will ask her to work with Cameron and other children in small group counseling to foster a better understanding among the children.
* I will touch base with Cameron every day once I return.
* We will stay in close contact with Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair.

Mr. and Mrs, Sinclair please call us immediately should Cameron feel unsafe in any way. Thanks again for sharing your concerns with us. We will continue our commitment in keeping Cameron safe.

Thank you Ms. Teacher, Ms. Secretary and Ms. Councelor for your continued dedication and support.

Regards, ~Mrs. Principal

________________________________
From: Cameron's Teacher
Sent: Thu 12/3/2009 2:27 PM
To: Principal
Subject: RE:

FYI- Cameron Sinclair
Did a total class lesson- 2nd step.Talked to small group of identified students.Talked to Cameron alone and determined that the JONATHON is from Room 12.Unable to phone Gabrielle's mom. Sent note with Prime Time teachers so she will be sure to get it.Talked to Mrs. Sinclair after school assuring her that we are working on it. She was content. I hope you are feeling better!

xoxox
teacher
********************************

This past Thursday, December 10th, I got a call from the school nurse. Cameron had been punched in the face at lunch recess and was in the nurse's office being iced. We picked him up early, but by the time we were notified, it had been about 45 minutes and the redness was pretty much gone. I tried to get a good picture of his pink cheek to post here and to have for when/if we try to take further action against the school. Unfortunately, my good camera met the floor at 3-year-old-tantrum-miles-per-hour a few months ago and I haven't been able to replace it. So, no decent picture. By the way, we do have a camera now that hopefully we won't need for such pictures. We are still trying to decide how far we want to go with this. We are extremely concerned. We feel that there should be something more than "a talking to" and time out for such behavior. I don't care what the age is. School should be a safe place. I have worries that Cameron is going to be pushed from the top of the playground equipment. Or, something more extreme...is he going to be shanked? Is there going to be some kind of Cameron's Law in the future? I pray not.

I have more to say, but this is pretty long already. If anyone has any opinions/ideas on what we should do, please let me know through comments or email. We really are lost right now.

So, I have this blog to keep people updated.....

And I never write on it.

I've had many things going on. I promise to write more later TODAY.

Mr. Slinky

Last night after Cameron got his homework done, we played school. Cameron's idea; Cameron was the teacher. His name was Mr. Slinky. Sleeeen-Keey. It began with pretty much all of us being naughty students. We kept interrupting him while he was teaching, and Emily and Christopher kept grabbing stuff off of his "desk" when he wasn't looking. At one point he realized that his desk was cleared. Then what it sounded like he said was, "Hey, where'd my sh*t go?" Did your eyebrows just raise? Ours did. (Me, Christopher, Emily) But since Chris didn't hear it, and I wasn't 100% positive, I didn't make a big deal out of it. Christopher gave his stuff back to him and he continued on. He was talking to us about his pet bird named Austin. It is a stuffed eagle that he plays with. We were allowed to ask questions but we had to raise our hands first. You know, like in school. So, we raised our hands over and over, tattling on each other and making silly statements that had nothing to do with what he was talking about. Basically trying to see how far we could go before he got tired of playing so we could move on with our busy lives of Facebook, World of Warcraft, Blockbuster movies and other really important stuff.

There was a certain moment that I felt very ashamed of myself. Cameron, I mean, Mr. Slinky said that it was time for recess. So, we all yelled out" yay!" and ran out of the room while he was still talking. Like little kids. Oops. After a couple of minutes I came back, kinda thinking "school" was over and Cameron was on to something else. Not! What was I thinking, this is Cameron. His mind is like a still trap. He does not forget where he left off. (Right pawpaw?) The sight of that little boy just broke my heart. He was sitting quietly in the middle of his bed with his bottom lip quivering, tears dripping, and his cheeks flushed. I asked him what happened and he said everyone ran away. Ouch. We were supposed to line up at the door first so he could lead us. Aaww. So, I brought him back to the living room and I sat back down on the floor and became a good student. For a while anyway.

I found out, because I'm a good student and sat quietly and listened, that Austin doesn't eat mice, or frogs, or worms, or berries, or bird seed. He doesn't eat at all because eating is too exciting and Austin likes boring. He's also alive, not dead. And if you move your head side to side as if saying "no", Austin gets upset because that is too exciting. Strange bird. Silly boy. It was fun, for me anyway. I'd like to say I could have sat there all night with him. But my bottom was getting tired of sitting on that floor. So, I became restless just like the rest of the students around me. We egged each other on. I'd raise my hand to ask a question and Emily would poke me in the ribs with her bony fingers because I was "making it last too long with my questions, so stop it!". So I raised my hand again to tattle on her for poking me. And while she was getting in trouble, I'd stick my tongue out at her, then she would tattle on me. She ended up in time-out. Hee hee! That's what she gets for cutting up the whole time while I sat quietly and listened. Mr. Slinky knew I wasn't a trouble maker and he believed me when I denied sticking my tongue out.

But from there things just got worse. We just kept being naughty. Finally, Mr. Slinky yelled, "I HATE teaching first graders!" Again, did your eyebrows just raise? It got my mind wondering. Did he hear that at school? I raised my hand and told him I was in Kindergarten. He told me he likes Kindergartners. I asked him, "Why do you hate first graders? Does your teacher hate first graders too?" OK, get ready for this. He said, "No, she hates Kindergartners." I asked him how he knew, did she say it? And the answer was pretty long, but believable. She is after all, a first grade teacher. This year, due to budget cuts and lack of teachers, she is having to teach Kinder and 1st grade together. So, I don't know what to do with what he said. He's 5 yes, but why would he say that? Anyway, I didn't make a big deal of that either. I figure we'll just keep our ears peeled for anything else like that. And also ask what would YOU do? There's no point in saying anything to the teacher; she would just deny it. I don't want to start a big mess, because what if she didn't say it. And if she did, I'm sure she regretted it as soon as it crossed her lips. We all have our moments of frustration where our mouths say something before our brains shut us up. I know I have many, many times. But what if she really does hate teaching kindergartners? Advice?

Anyway, like I said, we didn't make a big deal out of it. He adores his teacher and we don't want him to know she did something wrong. We just continued to play school for a few more minutes until he dismissed us and walked us to where our parents were waiting. He told us he'll see us tomorrow and waved goodbye. Then he went back to his desk because"teachers live at school."

It was incredibly precious and I really enjoyed the whole thing. I hope we can do it again, and I hope we can capture some of it on video.

Catch-update

Since it has been half of forever since I've posted anything, I figured I'd do a catch-up/update post.

We have ultimately decided to keep Cameron in the school he's in. We did find another school that was individual study. We would have to meet with his "teaching coordinator" once a month, pick up his school work and turn in the previous month's work. So basically, home school where he would get one on one help from me. We would also have to go to the school for speech therapy once or twice a week. And they had half-day Kindergarten on Wednesdays where he could be with other kids his age, and full days on Thursdays. Since, the drive is not close, I wasn't looking forward to it. We enrolled him anyway, because we want what's best for him. Unfortunately, his birth certificate has managed to vanish and that put a glitch in the process. While we were waiting for the enrollment to go through, I kept him home. He was BORED and wanted to go to school and see his friends. And that was only two days. So we are sticking it out till winter break. If things haven't really improved, we will go ahead and switch him. So far, we are getting quite a bit of help. It looks like he may have a processing disorder, which I already suspected and have been trying to tell the pediatrician for a while. The pediatrician said they would find out at school and we could go from there. Well, the teacher HAS noticed a problem and got the ball rolling for some help. If I wouldn't have kept him there, we wouldn't have gotten that started. As far as the Spanish speaking. I'm just going to make sure they hear me loud and clear when Cameron has problems. And I'm not going to any more of the parent meetings.

In other news...most of the family knows, but for those who don't, Amanda and Kenny split up. It was all very dramatic and I'm happy to say that she is now in Texas with family and can move on with her life. She can go to school now and just started a new job. Something she wasn't "allowed" to do when they were together because she would've been around guys. Oh, did I say too much? Ooh, tragic. I'll stop there and just say, YAY! I'm soooooo glad she snapped out of her stupor. And I'm so happy she's got a job and a place to stay and lots of family around her. So, so happy. Again, YAY!

I spent this past weekend in a classroom doing 15 hours of training to become Family Childcare Certified in California. Wow, we have allot to do. California is so much more strict on childproofing. But I understand why. ALL of our drawers and cabinets most be locked whether they are empty or not, because of earthquakes. When I did FCC in Spain, we just had to lock cabinets on the children's level. Not so here, since stuff can fall on them. We are also responsible for preparing an earthquake backpack for each child in our care with enough supplies and food for 3 days in case we do have an earthquake or fire and the kids are stuck with me for a few days. Oh boy, I'm not sure if 3 days of supplies can fit in a backpack. I SHOULD know, but I don't. Yes, my LDS friends, I have not gotten my emergency stuff in order like I should. I had it together a few years ago, and it came in very handy when we had to evacuate within 15 minutes because of a wildfire. And let me tell you, it did not fit in a backpack. No way, no how. Uh uh. More like 2 pretty big Rubbermaid totes. And we STILL forgot the sleeping bags. And we used it up because we couldn't go home for two days and I still have not replenished it. Stoooopid. Anyway, I don't know how I would grab 6 small kids and emergency supplies and haul butt out the door, but I guess as long as I'm prepared I can do the best I can.

Well, that's all I've got for now. If I missed anything, let me know. Take care now, bye bye then.

Burning the Bridge Behind Me..233

OK, it's been half of forever since I posted. I've been slacking, I know. I haven't exercised, I haven't been watching what I eat. Basically I fell off the wagon. I haven't stepped on the scale in a few weeks, so I'm surprised that my weight isn't worse. I figured I'd at least be 236.

I'm gonna get real now. I can't just expect to go from sedentary to suddenly working out 6 days a week. So, I'm going to commit to working out 3 times this week. I can do that. I know I can. And if I work out more than 3 times, great. If not, I'm not going to guilt myself about it. This does not have to be all or nothing. Some movement is better than none at all. So here I go again.

Burning the Bridge Behind Me...232

Grrr. Last Monday I was 228. All was going good. Then suddenly I ended up on an emotional rollercoaster ride. I've been losing sleep over a few things. I'm worried and stressed. I haven't been watching what I eat. And I only did one workout. So, I gained weight.

It's looking like a couple of situations are going to work out and I can stop stressing so much. Hopefully, I can get some sleep and have some energy to do what I gotta do. This next week will probably be kinda hard as we work to get Cameron into a different situation. I'm gonna be doing some running around and may not have time to fit in many workouts. I'm gonna have to really watch what I eat and be creative with getting some movement in.

Still haven't heard from Ortho.

Well, that's all I've got. Till next week.